Yeah, I know—an article about New Year’s resolutions. Real original. But, this isn’t about what I’m doing (or even what you’re doing). It’s about how to present yourself as though you have grand and glorious dreams, which you will fulfill in the next year. You won’t, of course, but the point is to impress your friends and strike fear into your enemies. Now, your hollow boasting on social media can 100% one-up your friends. We’re not talking of the ridiculous-but-practical shit, like most people have. Oh, I’m gonna lose 50 pounds. Oh, I’m gonna get healthy and stop smoking a dozen cigars a day. Oh, I’m gonna look up my long-lost grandma and go visit her in the old country, after seeing one of those genealogy sites. No—none of that garbage. You’re gonna tell everyone— but not do—one of the following. Bonus points if you actually do it, but, come on, it’s a New Year’s resolution. Nothing ever comes of those. Instead, you’re just gonna make everyone jealous of your dangerously bold ambition. Tell your friends and family that this year, you’re going to...
Breed giant slugs in an attempt to sell their slime as a miracle cure.
Run for political office on a "legalize cocaine" platform.
Buy a convenience store and eat everything inside it within a month.
Go to Africa and wrestle a gorilla.
Stay in the USA and wrestle a gorilla.
Invent a new shower hygiene device, that cleans "all the crevices, even the squirmy ones."
Win a slam dunk competition, thanks to your patented spring shoes.
Eat one of those giant steaks that, if you can finish it, you get it free—the kind served at one of those steakhouses that cuts off your tie, if you come in wearing one.
Set up the world’s biggest ant farm in your living room.
See if you can live off a diet of roots and grubs, like primitive man.
Build a fully livable house out of crabgrass and buffalo shit.
Collect every vintage Garbage Pail Kids card and use them to decorate your car.
Sail around the world in a kiddie pool full of gravy.
Hold a public debate on the merits of artificial insemination, while hurling water balloons full of tapioca at spectators.
Turn your garage into a full-service massage parlor. FULL full service. Wink, wink.
Tame and ride the noble walrus across the ocean, or, at least, a little ways across a good-sized lake.
Start a business selling bath towels with a Soviet Russian theme, which "make wet people sad."
Grow a houseplant that satisfies all your needs.
Figure out what the hell spelt is.
Carry around an expensive wireless mic, everywhere you go, so that when someone inevitably tries to steal it, you can yell "my crophone!"
Write a new Christmas carol that includes the word "bitches" at least three times.
Punch an emu (or any other ratite) right in the goddamned FACE!
Set up a food cart that serves weak, lukewarm coffee called a "depresso."
Pelt a petitioner with at least one egg.
Feel up an alpaca and hear its noise.
Create a new deodorant brand with the flagship scent "baby formula and cognac."
Give a dog a bath at a public park—a dog which does not belong to you. And, also, a bath of liquid caramel.
Give blood. To someone. That isn’t yours.
Ride and/or die.
Successfully petition Webster’s to add "grundle" to the dictionary.
Shave someone’s grundle—someone who needs it.
Write a book about how to cook a lavish dinner, when all you have is a 40 oz of Old English and eight grapes.
Invent a giant, smoothbore dildo cannon, in case Godzilla shows up and you need to fuck him in the ass.
Become an older, dirtier bastard.
DJ a wedding of people you don’t know by knocking out the initial DJ and beatboxing into the mic, until they give you a free pass to the bar in order to get you to shut up.
Play God... until it gets boring. Then, play Uno.
Cheat at Uno in ways that will make the experts question why you’re completely corrupting a family game.
Develop a mobile app that matches people looking to date with people currently taking a dump.
Find a way to use the phrase "because deez nuts," every single day for the whole year.
Figure out what a "hurgusburgus" is; sell it to others.
Beat up every sudoku player you know.
Master the art of making a perfect Philly cheesesteak in the shower.
Memorize 120 Days Of Sodom and quote it to people like it were the bible.
Try to market a revolutionary 3"x4" index card.
Sack Rome.
See if you can sell your lawn clippings as an inexpensive, vegan meat substitute.
Bet on sporting events, using nothing but a dump truck of chocolate coins.
Be a better ally to people utterly beaten by Pac-Man.
Climb a mountain made of nothing but rich, creamy nougat.
Crochet a series of novelty condoms out of polyester.
Make the world’s most unwholesome plate of nachos.
Find out where Amelia Earhart’s remains are and then use them to digitally model a sex doll with her likeness.
Same with Jimmy Hoffa.
Spend your downtime weeping into the open bell of a tuba.
Dig a hole in the ground and list it on Airbnb.
Make a luxury candle that smells like Screech (Dustin Diamond) from "Saved By The Bell."
Visit a foreign country and get kicked out, for yelling at everyone that they’re doing things wrong.
Realize that your relationships are as depthless as you are—and, that you will never find happiness with another person, because the characteristics you desire in others are just as superficial as your own. However, because you lack the capability to be self-satisfied, you are thus are doomed to a slow, awkward slog toward death, with at-best mediocre people limply pretending to hold your hand the whole way, until something better comes along.
Get a ball pit for your home.
Get a ball pit for your neighbor’s home.
Learn how to recycle all that pee you’ve been keeping in jars. Someone has to want it...right?
Alright, that’s about all I have that will fit. Feel free to pick and choose from the list or mix-and-match. You’ll totally wow everyone and make it look like you’ve got it all on the ball, when you say your resolution is to build a 1:1 statue of Muhammad Ali out of beef jerky (or any of the above).
Knock ‘em dead. They won’t check next year.
By the way, my resolution is to do another one of these next January.
P.S. If anyone does any of these, drop me a line and let me know.
Wombstretcha The Magniflcent is a writer, counter-counter-terrorism expert, Ray Charles impersonator, cat taunter, sushi evangelist and retired rapper from Portland, OR. He can be found at Wombstretcha. com, on Twitter as @Wombstretcha503 and on Facebook (and MeWe, the no-jail Facebook) as "Wombstretcha The Magniflcent."
